Pledge

Corruption & human rights

The Global Anti-Corruption Consortium team at Transparency International engaged my services as a specialist facilitator to deliver this complex and highly-sensitive project in 2019. The project involved training a group of 11 people – drawn from communities across the country – in basic filmmaking and supporting them to collaboratively devise and author a film that gave voice to their experiences of human rights abuses and corruption under the regime of Yahya Jammeh.

The resulting short documentary Hyena explores the impact of the Jammeh dictatorship in The Gambia and charts the regime’s grand corruption – it is estimated to have stolen almost $1billion of public funds – in the smallest country in mainland Africa.

“This project managed to tell the story of people from six different communities who suffered in very different ways under the dictatorship of Yahya Jammeh. The video made a real difference to those people’s lives – helping them share experiences many had been suppressing for years.”

— CORNELIA ABEL (GLOBAL ANTI-CORRUPTION CONSORTIUM)

The premiere of Hyena (October 2019) in the capital Banjul was the first time stories of Jammeh’s corruption – its devastating impact on citizens and communities – were heard by stakeholders from government and civil society. The film quickly became national news and was broadcast by two national television stations (QTV and StarTV) followed by panel discussions on the issues it raises.

Hyena was formerly submitted to the TRRC as evidence and is being used to prepare recommendations to government. The commission also requested additional footage (including interviews and content too sensitive for broadcast) which helped them to hear additional testimonies from citizens in remote parts of the country. As a result, three project participants were called to give testimony to the commission in their televised hearings.

Read more about Gareth and his work here.

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